from (C)OVID'S METAMORPHOSIS, Book the Second


The Story of Aglauros, Transform’d into a Statue

Leave your groceries in the sun for several days
so the neighbors can see the bounty
of your labors: lob some off-
brand chocolates over your neighbors’ 
fence to show them you mean business.
You spy them through the keyhole
touching each other’s faces in a writhing 
rat king knot. 
The shortest distance between two 
princesses is the time it takes
to walk down the street six feet 
behind a hunch-backed hierophant
texting who knows who & laughing 
to himself like a vacuum in heat. 
Don’t go looking for trouble 
on the empty streets
because Lucifer always shows up sooner
or later, coughing up clotted blood 
but decked out in hazmat yellow. 
Your face froze like that
& the rest of you did, too. 

Europa’s Rape

There’s much & more to be said
about taking up residence as a garden
hermit. You’ll wait out the storm
in your own private hovel, 
roaming the rich man’s property
when he sleeps even as you
tuck his keepsakes into 
the secret pockets of your tattered
robes.  Your money is useless 
now we use bitcoins to buy 
bidet futures from the AI & the theme park
mascots have all gone home
leaving their skins flapping 
on the Matterhorn like deflated lungs.
The arcades have been empty 
since the ‘90s anyway & a family 
of chattering apes has moved 
into the Big Buck Hunter 
at the back of Kid Rock's Big Ass 
Honky Tonk Rock N’ Roll Steakhouse;
in this new world the mechanical bull
rides you.

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from (C)OVID'S METAMORPHOSIS, Book the Fifth

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